{"id":17820,"date":"2022-02-04T14:15:30","date_gmt":"2022-02-04T19:15:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ilsr.org\/articles\/surcharges-on-waste-disposal-fund-composting\/"},"modified":"2025-10-10T16:22:33","modified_gmt":"2025-10-10T20:22:33","slug":"disposal-surcharges-fund-composting","status":"publish","type":"article","link":"https:\/\/ilsr.org\/es\/article\/composting-for-community\/disposal-surcharges-fund-composting","title":{"rendered":"Recargos sobre el Fondo de Eliminaci\u00f3n de Residuos Compostaje"},"template":"","class_list":["post-17820","article","type-article","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","initiatives-composting-for-community","impact_areas-climate-and-environmental-justice","authors-sophia-jones"],"acf":{"details":{"featured_image":1740,"background_color":"tan","article_type":false,"initiative":15,"display_event_fields":false,"start_date":null,"end_date":null,"start_time":null,"end_time":null,"time_zone":"America\/New_York","virtual_event":false,"location":"","topics":false,"impact_areas":[16],"abstract":"

More than 42 million tons of food scraps are landfilled or burned in the US each year, as estimated by the EPA. One reason among many is lack of adequate funding to prevent, rescue, and recycle wasted food. One funding mechanism with a proven track record of raising funds to reduce and recycle waste is the establishment of a per-ton surcharge on waste landfilled or incinerated. This article features ten examples of existing regulations that allocate revenue from waste disposal surcharges to fund waste diversion, reuse, recycling, composting, and other sustainability efforts, and extracts best practices and possible roadblocks that may help to guide the development of new legislation to fund composting and divert waste.… Read More<\/a><\/p>\r\n","authors_tax":[629]},"sidebar":{"title":"\u00cdndice"},"page_layout":[{"acf_fc_layout":"layout_wysiwyg","_acfe_flexible_toggle":"","component_wysiwyg":{"content":"

<\/div>\r\nMore than 42 million tons of food scraps are landfilled or burned in the US each year, as estimated by the <\/span>EPA<\/span><\/a>. One reason among many is lack of adequate funding to prevent, rescue, and recycle wasted food. According to <\/span>ReFED<\/span><\/a>, an annual investment of $14 billion over the next ten years is needed to reduce current levels of wasted food. Such investment would result in $73 billion in annual net financial benefit, cut greenhouse gas emissions by 75 million metric tons, save 4 trillion gallons of water, and recover the equivalent of 4 billion meals for those in need. ReFED\u2019s <\/span>Roadmap to 2030: Reducing U.S. Food Waste by 50%<\/span><\/i><\/a> outlines myriad solutions that governments, business, philanthropic funders, and other stakeholders can take to accelerate change. Financing these solutions via grants, low-cost capital, commercial project financing, and other funding mechanisms is critical.<\/span>\r\n\r\nOne funding mechanism with a proven track record of raising funds to reduce and recycle waste is the establishment of a per-ton surcharge on waste landfilled or incinerated. A waste disposal surcharge is typically a fee added to the per-ton tipping fees charged for waste disposal at waste disposal sites. <\/span>Some state<\/span><\/a> and local governments levy waste disposal surcharges to solely support agency costs for solid waste facility licensing, permitting, registration or operation. Others use these per-ton surcharges to also support the establishment, expansion, and maintenance of recycling and composting projects.<\/span>\r\n\r\nThis article features ten examples of existing regulations that allocate revenue from waste disposal surcharges to fund waste diversion, reuse, recycling, composting, and other sustainability efforts, and extracts best practices and possible roadblocks that may help to guide the development of new legislation to fund composting and divert waste.<\/span>\r\n\r\n \r\n

Does \u201cRecycling\u201d Include Composting?<\/span><\/h2>\r\nIn existing legislation, the term \u2018recycling\u2019 is often used broadly and includes composting, whether implicitly or explicitly. Recycling has a broad definition involving the process of transforming waste into (re)usable items, therefore composting, the process of transforming organic waste into a valuable soil amendment, is understood to be included in most definitions of recycling. <\/span>Wisconsin<\/span><\/a> is one state in which the absence of composting-specific language in the legislation actually restricts grant funds from being available for composting projects. This demonstrates the significance of specifying composting in addition to recycling where possible in order to emphasize its value as a waste diversion method.<\/span>\r\n\r\n \r\n

Examples of Existing Regulation<\/span><\/h2>\r\nThe ten frameworks featured here exhibit clear paths for funding to flow from disposal surcharge revenue to recycling and composting programs, projects, infrastructure, and education. Featured states include <\/span>New Jersey<\/a><\/strong>, Pennsylvania<\/a><\/strong>, Minnesota<\/a><\/strong>, Wisconsin<\/a><\/strong>, North Carolina<\/a><\/strong>, Iowa<\/a><\/strong>, Ohio<\/a><\/strong>, and <\/span>Indiana<\/a><\/strong>. <\/span>Alameda County<\/a><\/strong> and <\/span>Santa Clara County<\/a><\/strong> in California are also great examples of surcharge policies and waste diversion grant programs administered at the local level. While this article features states with surcharges that fund waste diversion, <\/span>other states<\/span><\/a> (e.g. Arizona, Illinois, Michigan, Mississippi, Colorado, West Virginia) have similar programs that may focus on more general waste management.<\/span>\r\n\r\nThe overview tables below summarize key data of each state or local program. See our<\/span> Composting Rules Library<\/span><\/a> for more detailed descriptions of each policy. <\/span>\r\n\r\n\"\"\r\n
Table 1: Overview of Disposal Surcharges<\/span><\/h6>\r\n
Source: <\/span>ILSR 2022<\/span><\/a><\/h6>\r\n \r\n\r\n\"\"\r\n
Table 2: Disposal Surcharge Revenue and Administration<\/span><\/h6>\r\n
Source: <\/span>ILSR 2022<\/span><\/a><\/h6>\r\n \r\n\r\n\"\"\r\n
Table 3: Overview of Grant Programs<\/span><\/h6>\r\n
Source: <\/span>ILSR 2022<\/span><\/a><\/h6>\r\n \r\n\r\nIn general, waste haulers pay the disposal surcharges at the disposal site. In the unique case of <\/span>Minnesota<\/span><\/a>, the surcharge is collected at the generator-level; households and businesses are billed directly based on waste generated (Table 1). Surcharge collection and resulting grant programs are typically administered by the state or local government\u2019s designated environmental agency (Table 2). As shown in Table 3, most of the example states and counties use surcharge revenue to provide financial assistance to local governments for waste diversion. Some also use surcharge revenue to administer competitive grants for waste diversion projects by various non-government entities such as academic institutions, nonprofits, for-profit businesses, and other organizations. Another way that states and counties use surcharge revenue is to fund other environmental programs such as land conservation and remediation, water quality management, litter prevention and cleanup, greenhouse gas reduction, and environmental education.<\/span>\r\n\r\n \r\n

Investment and impact on in-state waste diversion <\/span><\/h3>\r\nThese surcharge-funded grant programs have each provided significant investment into waste diversion programs and infrastructure, demonstrating tangible impact on waste reduction, reuse, recycling, and composting. In Indiana, 2020 grant awards from both the<\/span> Community Recycling Grant Program<\/span><\/a> and the<\/span> Recycling Market Development Program<\/span><\/a> totaled over $1.8 million, efforts which created up to 47 new jobs and increased the amount of recycled materials by almost 85,000 tons. In Minnesota<\/span>, <\/span>SCORE grants<\/span><\/a> t<\/span>o counties provide support for county compliance with the state-mandated 35%-minimum recycling rate, with 50% of the grant funds to be used for organics recycling programs. Iowa\u2019s <\/span>Solid Waste Alternatives Program (SWAP)<\/span><\/a> provides financial assistance to various projects including community <\/span>education and training on composting<\/span><\/a>, on-campus <\/span>food waste composting program<\/span><\/a>, a <\/span>concrete pad<\/span><\/a> for school waste composting, and <\/span>purchase and use of compost spreaders<\/span><\/a> to encourage lawn application of compost. Also, Iowa\u2019s <\/span>Food Storage Capacity Grant Initiative<\/span><\/a> awarded over $400,000 to 80 entities in 2020 and 2021 to expand food storage capacity and avoid wasted food.<\/span>\r\n\r\nOn the East Coast, New Jersey\u2019s DEP awarded <\/span>$16 million in grants<\/span><\/a> to fund municipal and county recycling programs in 2021. And, <\/span>in 2020, Pennsylvania\u2019s <\/span>Food Recovery Infrastructure Grant<\/span><\/a> provided $9.6 million to 145 projects focused on diverting edible food waste from landfills, rescuing almost 1 million pounds of food from landfills, distributing edible food to over 25,000 Pennsylvania residents over the course of the year. At the local level, StopWaste<\/span> Waste Prevention Grants<\/span><\/a> in Alameda County allocated over $580,000 in 2021 to local nonprofits and businesses for waste reduction and diversion, in addition to allocating almost $5 million to municipalities for municipal recycling program expansion. These examples illustrate the wide array of projects that can be supported by waste disposal surcharges. They demonstrate concrete and widespread impact on not only waste diversion projects and infrastructure, such as for composting, but also on the economy by empowering small businesses, creating jobs, strengthening communities, and building the circular economy.<\/span>\r\n\r\n \r\n

Beyond waste diversion<\/span><\/h3>\r\nSome states extend their investment of waste surcharge revenue beyond waste diversion to include support for other environmental programs. Many use funds to address litter control and land remediation, such as Pennsylvania\u2019s Growing Greener Plus watershed restoration and mining reclamation projects, North Carolina\u2019s cleanups of hazardous sites, Wisconsin\u2019s land cleanup and remediation programs, Minnesota\u2019s landfill cleanup and environmental monitoring, and Ohio\u2019s litter prevention and cleanup projects. <\/span>\r\n\r\nOther examples of environmental programs supported by disposal surcharge revenue include Alameda County\u2019s support for carbon farm planning, sustainable landscaping, and energy efficiency programs, Ohio\u2019s $8-9 million in annual <\/span>operational grants<\/span><\/a> to Ohio Soil and Water Conservation Districts, and <\/span>Iowa\u2019s Solid Waste Environmental Management System Program<\/span><\/a>, which allows local solid waste planning areas to participate in training and technical assistance for continuous improvement in six environmental program areas, ranging from recycling to water quality improvements to greenhouse gas reduction, incentivized by a reduced waste disposal surcharge rate. These states provide examples of how supporting environmental projects using surcharge revenue can extend this funding mechanism beyond the polluter pays principle, with further reinvestment into environmental conservation, regeneration, and sustainability.<\/span>\r\n\r\n \r\n

Lessons Learned: Using Surcharges to Fund Waste Diversion<\/span><\/h2>\r\nEach disposal surcharge policy and its relationship to recycling, composting, and other environmental efforts is unique, with its own pros and cons. These surcharges serve as a self-funding mechanism to both build recycling infrastructure and disincentivize waste disposal in landfills. This is a major incentive to pass laws like this for other states and localities that experience lack of funding as a hindering factor for the passage or long-term success of sustainability-related legislation. With more funds allocated to waste diversion efforts, diversion rates should improve. According to a <\/span>2021 report<\/span><\/a> by Eunomia, the states featured here all boast recycling rates ranking in the top 3\/5 of states, with four of them in the top 1\/5.<\/span>\r\n\r\nFurthermore, supplementing fees on waste disposal with incentives to reduce and recycle waste encourages a transition from disposal habits toward behavior that prioritize reduction and diversion. A 2015 <\/span>study<\/span><\/a> on landfill tipping fees found that higher per-ton tipping fees at landfills correlate with lower percentages of total generated solid waste that is landfilled (see Figure 1). Provision of accessible incentives to reduce and divert waste paves a clearer direction for the efforts of households, businesses, waste facilities, and communities toward greater reduction and diversion.<\/span>\r\n\r\n\"\"\r\n
Figure 1: U.S. State Tipping Fees and Landfilled Percentage<\/span><\/h6>\r\n
Source: <\/span>Landfill Tipping Fees in California<\/span><\/a> (CalRecycle 2015)<\/span><\/h6>\r\n \r\n\r\nBased on ILSR\u2019s analysis and comparison of various policies, we note the following considerations for others interested in constructing similar policies: <\/span>\r\n